


Rompster Joins the Squad

by iamocelost



Series: Fanfics My Husband Writes [3]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Mission Fic, Parody, bad cat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-09
Updated: 2017-08-09
Packaged: 2018-12-13 04:42:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11752239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamocelost/pseuds/iamocelost
Summary: Shepard inherits a cat. The cat joins the squad.





	Rompster Joins the Squad

**Author's Note:**

> My husband wrote a new fanfic. It may or may not be inspired by real cats, living or deceased.

“So, Shepard, tell me again what this, um, organism, is called.”

Garrus’s whisper was hushed but businesslike. He and Shepard, ducked in shadow, made their way through the now desolate halls of the trading floor at Nos Astra Station. Thirty paces ahead, rolling supine in a trapezoid of light, was a mammalian quadruped whose belly revealed a vast puff of white fur. Today, this animal was the final third of their squad.

“He’s Rompster,” said Shepard.

“That’s … a rompster,” said Garrus.

“His name is Rompster. He’s a bad cat.”

Garrus said nothing. The two continued forward, their boots emitting low, tremulous clanks that echoed down the hall.

Shepard continued, “He is – was – Chakwas’s bad cat. She made me promise that if anything happened to her, I’d take care of her bad cat. So here we are.”

“But what is a, um, bad cat?” Garrus tried out what was, to him, the strange, new compound noun. He awkwardly emphasized the first syllable—like _Baghdad_ or _cauldron_ or _beefy_. _Bad-_ cat.

“Cats are little, um” – Shepard twisted her mouth, suddenly irritated with the prospect of defining _cat_ for the uninitiated – “these little weirdos humans live with sometimes.”

“Ah. Like human children.”

Shepard thought about this. “Sure. More or less.”

“And, um, Rompster is a special breed of cat? A _bad_ cat?”

“I think he’s a Maine Coon, or like half Maine Coon. He’s – never mind. He’s bad because he’ll just knock shit on the floor when he’s hungry. And sometimes he bites you if you don’t rub his belly.”

At this, Garrus suddenly bellowed with laughter that thundered through the desolate hallway, past the festooned debris, the torn advertisements for Serrice amps, the occasional flickering opal light. Rompster, alarmed, sprang upright and frantically swiveled his ears. Then he ran off toward the shadowy expanse of the main display plaza.

“God damnit. Shhh!” hissed Shepard.

Still quivering with giggly residua, Garrus choked an apology. “My great uncle Mavelenius would also bite on such occasions. It’s humorous to me.”

Shepard lacked the time or desire to know more. “We’ll reminisce about family history later. I hear something.”

Soft footfalls and a short guttural screech sounded in the near distance. Approaching the end of the hallway, Shepard and Garrus peered around the corner into the cavernous, dimly-lit plaza, where two willowy, distended, metallic forms loomed near the room’s center.

“Banshees. Let’s hit ‘em.”

Shepard counted to three with her fingers and the pair attacked. Shepard somersaulted into the open, raised her assault rifle, and fired a burst. The volley struck the first banshee in the face and neck, ripping through metal and flesh. The ex-asari wailed and folded in a misshapen heap.

Garrus had followed suit, now centering the second banshee in his reticle. As he fired, the figure evaporated in a halo of blinding crystalline blue light. The bullets passed through vapor and struck the opposite wall in a staccato clatter. His eyes pained, Garrus winced and lowered his weapon in time to see his foe teleport forward—once, again, three times—and then manifest a meter to his left. As he raised his rifle against the cruel blue flash, the banshee’s sinewy metal claw ripped through the air, gouging the gun barrel in half. Garrus recoiled backward as the banshee shrieked and raised her second claw.

 _Crash!_ The startled monster’s lithe torso swiveled a half-turn toward what looked like the remains of an old crockpot shattered on the metal tile behind it. As the banshee looked back, Garrus had drawn his pistol and blew a clean hole through its vacuous chrome eye.

Silence and stillness settled almost as immediately and unnervingly as violence had. Garrus and Shepard panted.

But just moments after the second banshee fell, so too fell an empty aluminum can. It bounced off the dead cyborg’s grotesque, horned brow with a sharp _tink_.

Shepard and Garrus exchanged looks, then craned their necks toward the surveillance floor overlooking the plaza. Another can took flight, propelled, they now saw, by a small white foot.

Rompster peered over the floor’s edge. “Mrow,” he said.

Aligning his haunches, Rompster cautiously hopped down to ground level. “Prrrmoowt!” he declared.

“Bad cat, huh?” Garrus said to Shepard, who smiled through waning waves of adrenaline.

“Good work, bad cat.” Garrus reached down, still a little unsurely, to pet his squad mate. Rompster bit him.

**Author's Note:**

> In case you're wondering, my husband has never played a Mass Effect game. Often he'll ask me things like, "Is there a place in Mass Effect where you'd have a lot of levels?" and I'll direct him to an appropriate wikia entry. Collaboration at its best.


End file.
